Broken
by CZGoldEdition
Summary: Months after Miranda, River gives Zoe some advice that she's too stubborn to take. A short vignette. WashZoe. Post BDM and contains spoilers.


At night the echoes wouldn't let her be. During the day she could blot them out, distracting herself with what need be done to help keep the crew fed and their rickety boat sailin' the sky, but at day's end she inevitably found herself exhausted and facing a night spent in a too-empty bunk.  
_Whacky fun!  
Can we start with the part where Jayne gets knocked out by a 90-pound girl? Because I don't think that's ever getting old.  
I think you're pretty much down to ritual suicide, lambie-toes.  
You with the bathing, me with the watching you bathe...  
Tend to or have to?  
I love my wife.  
I'd do anything for you, you know that.  
I am a leaf on the wind, watch how I--_

Zoe's eyes snapped open to the semi-darkness of her quarters, and as they adjusted to the level of light, she could not stop her gaze from falling on the barren space beside her in the bed made for two. It gaped at her, a vast chasm akin to those left in the landscape by natural disasters of cataclysmic proportions - but even months after Miranda, the sight was anything but natural. She reached into the void instinctively, her fingers curling, bunching up a fistful of stone cold sheets in her fitfully sweaty grasp. The acute, familiar sting of unshed tears pushed roughly at the back of her eyeballs, sharp as Reaver harpoons, threatening to overtake her with the element of surprise on their side during the disoriented instant of waking. She fought them back angerly, blinking back the pain fiercely as she chided herself for the moment of weakness. She would not break - _could_ not break; Zoe'd witnessed more than her share of death. Why should this one be any different?

_But this death was more than just a man's, it was--_

She flinched as she felt _Serenity_ lurch around her, ripping her from her musings, and she gratefully seized the excuse to rise from her _(and Wash's)_ bed and leave the _(their)_ lonesome bunk for another mindless day.

She emerged into the crew hall to find the Captain doing the same, muttering something that sounded rather akin to his usual grumpy "nothing ever goes smooth".

"Sir?" she quired, snapping the laddered-hatch closed behind her as she straightened up on the deck.

He turned to face her, lifting his hands to the ceiling in an exasperated gesture.

"Why we gotta crash-land on every gorram planet? Can't we ever settle down all pixie-light and graceful?"

"Might have a thing to do with what Kaylee was sayin' 'bout needin' to replace the coupling on the grav thrust, sir," she noted, raising an eyebrow at him pointedly.

"I--"

Mal made as if to reply, brandishing a pointed finger in her direction, then glanced in the direction of the engine room and back again.

"--you sidin' with her? Ain't no way we can afford that part. 'Sides, we made do without it before, I do recall, haven't we?"

She folded her arms and fixed him with a condescending look.

"I ain't no mechanic, sir, nor to my knowledge are you. But I find said "crash-landings" to be pretty compelling evidence to her credit. We need to replace it, so we'll find the coin for it, or maybe see if we can't send her out to barter for it on Santo once we set down, like she suggested."

The ship lurched again, more violently this time, as if to solidify the point.

"_Ai ya shi rén xin fú nu shi_", Mal nodded, "Right. Fine. I'll go let her know, then I gotta make sure the cargo's secure before we hit dirt. Go on up to the bridge and keep an eye on River, I'm halfways convinced she's been crashin' us on purpose to win this argument and get Kaylee outta her mood."

Zoe smirked in reply and began to walk off through the mess, ears catching the word "wiles" from behind her as she went. She swept onto the bridge a minute later and approached the pilot's _(Wash's)_ chair, bearing down on the _(out of place)_ occupant with a mixture of bemusement and concern.

"Cap'n thinks you're gonna crash us, li'l Albatross, that so?"

River spared her a piteous glance before returning her attention to wrestling with the controls _(her slender arms so unlike the muscular ones that came before them, thickly peppered with golden-blonde hairs, rippling in the effort to stabilize their altitude)_ as the planet swiftly grew in size _(beyond the lineup of miniature plastic dinosaurs)_ outside the cockpit window.

"Broken," she noted sadly, her tone faraway and out of place with the concentration she demonstrated in her task.

"She ain't broke," Zoe insisted firmly, "Just a bit scraped up is all. The Cap'n finally agreed to let Kaylee try and get her hands on some new parts she's been needing. You get her on the ground now and we should be right shiny for the months to come."

The ship began to shutter more violently as they pierced further into the atmosphere, the typography of the ground below rapidly increasing in definition.

"Likes who she has now just fine, but prefers what she used to have. Once graceful with precision, now just flies where she has to. Doesn't master the sky, just exists in it. Still functions, just not as well, never as well. Needs a part that cannot be replaced."

Zoe found herself gripping the back of the young woman's _(Wash's)_ seat, her knuckles white with the pressure, but the action only vaguely registered with her senses.

"You're a fine pilot, River," she stated evenly, "_Serenity_ couldn't have found her way into better hands."

The reader furrowed her brow as the ground grew nearer still and she leveled the ship out as best she could for their final approach. Zoe assumed this to be an outward indication of the girl's focus - perhaps telltale of some complex set of calculations running through that moon-sized brain of hers that would prevent most of the damage to _Serenity_'s hull that ordinarily would result from bringing a boat in this fast.

River shook her head.

"No, no math, more complicated that math - feeling," she stated, and then more softly, "Wasn't talking about _Serenity_."

Zoe pulled her hand away as if burned, her voice taking on a distinctly colder edge, "Just get us down," and turned to head out the hatchway, deciding to meet Mal down in the bay to check on how he and their client's cargo were fairing.

"I feel everything - I felt everything," River called from her seat, and Zoe slowed to a stop, leaning against the door frame - not turning to face the voice, but inexplicibly rooted to the spot as the girl spoke her peace, "From both sides. Love like no other. Not even Simon loves me or Kaylee as much as the feeling that strung the sides together. Went beyond love; was your humanity. Half of the whole. Leaf of the flower."

A beat of silence not at all filled with the groaning bulkhead and rattling panels, and Zoe offered a reply. The Reaver harpoons jabbed at her eyes again, but she kept her voice cold and steady, if quieter than before.

"There is nothing left to feel."

"You're wrong. The feelings were too strong to chase away. No shame in admitting to a breakdown," River observed as she extended _Serenity_'s landing gear and settled them to the dusty terrain below with a pitching jolt, "Only in recognizing it can you achieve a solution."

Zoe lingered for a few seconds that felt an eon as the ship settled, gripping the smooth metal of the hatch for support - odd, as accustomed as she was to the sensation of real gravity replacing the artificial, she felt for an instant that her knees might give way. But as the engine cooled to a rest her legs locked, rigid and sturdy as always, and she strode from the bridge without a backwards glance, shooting instructions back at River as her booted feet carried her away with military precision, "Head to the engine room as soon as you get her settled. You'll accompany Kaylee into town to track down what we need."

-----

"Broke in two," Kaylee informed her, pointing at the offending cable underneath the messily welded together turbine that was _Serenity_'s heart, "See, that's why I told the Cap'n that we gotta get a whole new one. Dunno why he's gotta be so stubborn all the time, things'd be much easier if he jus' saw to the problem as soon as we pointed it out."

"Yes," River offered her a small, distant smile, echoing back her own words from over a year past, "Sometimes a thing get's broke can't be fixed."

**Chinese translation:**  
_Ai ya shi rén xin fú nu shi_ - "Damn compelling ladies".


End file.
